" RACKETEERING."

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 122, 25 May 1932, Page 9

" RACKETEERING."

BEGINNING IN SYDNEY. ON CHICAGO LINES. INTIMIDATION OF TRADESPEOPLE. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, May 20. Already Sydney has its "gangsters," who try in their own small way to emulate A 1 Capone and the "big shots" of Chicago and New York. There is the same callous disregard of the rights of property and the value of human life, the same misguided loyalty to leaders and comrades, and the same impenetrable silence regarding both friends and foes when any member of these sinister fraternities comes into contact with the hated police. By this time Sydneyites are fairly well accustomed to free shooting and razor slashing and other minor atrocities in certain quarters of the city. Now it seems that the gangs, profiting by American examples, are building up a system of "racketeering." The process has the great merit of simplicity. A member of the gang goes to shopkeepers or hawkers and demands tribute for the right to sell or trade. If the innocent victim hesitates he is threatened; if he proves obdurate he is "beaten up," and his shop is plundered or his wares are scattered broadcast over the streets. These methods have secured the establishment of highly profitable monopolies in the great American cities, where almost every sort of business pays tribute, directly or indirectly, to the "racketeer." The other day a number of men went to a shop in Surry Hills and demanded money. The owner refused, and he was promptly "knocked out" by the gang, who then proceeded to deal with his stock in trade. The police were informed, but all they can say so far is that they know that this sort of thing is going 011. What with the gangs, and racketeering, and the various imitations of the Camorra and other secret societies that have taken root in Sydney of late, this

Chicago that A 1 Capone governed before they locked him up. Happily,-at least a million of Sydney's inhabitants know nothing except what they- read, about these things. . - Crimes and the Crowd. '" " One reason that the criminal classes have enjoyed so large a measure of immunity in Sydney is that they seem to have infected a very large proportion of the masses—even the decent and honest workers —with their own detestation of the police. A considerable percentage of the wage-earning class in Australia appear to regard a policeman as their natural enemy —until they need his protection. It is a curious fact that the Communists, who are in a small minority, are never tired of denouncing the police as "bloodhounds" and "slaves of the bourgeoisie," but when public feeling turns strongly against them—as when a crusade was worked up against Communism a few months ago in the country districts, and its emissaries were "ridden on a rail" or pushed into the river—they appeal to the police most pathetically for aid. But the average crowd in Sydney does not, generally speaking, feel impelled to assist the police. There was a striking illustration of this prejudice the other day in Macquarie Place, where a detective tried to arrest a man suspected of a crime, found that he was getting the worst of the struggle. A large crowd looked on quite unmoved, and the suspect would have escaped if a Japanese, about half the size of the average Australian, had not plunged into the fray. A judicious application of a jiu-jitsu grip brought the offender to reason, and the constable marched him off in triumph. The little "Jap" was thanked afterwards by the police force, but it is surely an unhealthy feature of civic life here that a large number of able-bodied Australians can look on unmoved at such a struggle, while the duty of lending law and order a helping hand is left to a diminutive Oriental.